News / National
WHO boss must be probed for 'immorally' awarding Mugabe
24 Oct 2017 at 06:58hrs | Views
UN Watch, a non-governmental human rights group, welcomed the WHO's cancellation of its "absurd, immoral and insulting" appointment of Robert Mugabe as goodwill ambassador but called for a full, independent and international inquiry into any possible deals made between the WHO chief - Ethiopia's former foreign minister - and Zimbabwe's ruler, NewZimbabwe reported.
"There must be more to the story. How could Dr. Tedros, a sophisticated political figure, have chosen to honour a man who has brutalized human rights activists, crushed democracy dissidents, and turned the breadbasket of Africa and its health system into a basket-case?" asked UN Watch executive director Hillel Neuer.
"We regret that Dr. Tedros' statement shows no remorse, nor any mention of Mugabe's gross human rights abuses. On the contrary, he seems to double down and justify his decision by speaking of the need to 'include everyone', presumably tyrants as well."
"We ask Dr. Tedros to agree to a meeting in Geneva of victims of Mugabe, which we will gladly organize, giving the WHO chief a chance to compensate for the damage he has done to the cause of human rights in Zimbabwe.
He should now honour the victims, instead of the perpetrator."
"The tyrant of Zimbabwe is the last person who should have been legitimised by a U.N. position of any kind," said Neuer.
"Something is very ill at the U.N.'s world health agency."
However Mugabe is not new to controversial awards and to them being rescinded.
In the 1980s, at the height of the Gukurahundi genocide, universities of Michigan and Edinburg gave Mugabe doctorates. In 1988, a year after a food embargo in Matebeleland, Mugabe was awarded the anti-hunger prize sponsored by the Hunger Project. In 1994 he was knighted by the British government.
However some of these honours, awarded to a clearly anti-freedom Mugabe, were later rescinded in the 2000s following Mugabe's seizure of farms from whites his assault on opposition members.
The call to probe the WHO Chief comes after Zimbabwe foreign minister, Walter Mzembi, announced publicly that he had lobbied the UN body to honour Mugabe saying it was a "coup for Zimbabwe".
"There must be more to the story. How could Dr. Tedros, a sophisticated political figure, have chosen to honour a man who has brutalized human rights activists, crushed democracy dissidents, and turned the breadbasket of Africa and its health system into a basket-case?" asked UN Watch executive director Hillel Neuer.
"We regret that Dr. Tedros' statement shows no remorse, nor any mention of Mugabe's gross human rights abuses. On the contrary, he seems to double down and justify his decision by speaking of the need to 'include everyone', presumably tyrants as well."
"We ask Dr. Tedros to agree to a meeting in Geneva of victims of Mugabe, which we will gladly organize, giving the WHO chief a chance to compensate for the damage he has done to the cause of human rights in Zimbabwe.
He should now honour the victims, instead of the perpetrator."
"The tyrant of Zimbabwe is the last person who should have been legitimised by a U.N. position of any kind," said Neuer.
However Mugabe is not new to controversial awards and to them being rescinded.
In the 1980s, at the height of the Gukurahundi genocide, universities of Michigan and Edinburg gave Mugabe doctorates. In 1988, a year after a food embargo in Matebeleland, Mugabe was awarded the anti-hunger prize sponsored by the Hunger Project. In 1994 he was knighted by the British government.
However some of these honours, awarded to a clearly anti-freedom Mugabe, were later rescinded in the 2000s following Mugabe's seizure of farms from whites his assault on opposition members.
The call to probe the WHO Chief comes after Zimbabwe foreign minister, Walter Mzembi, announced publicly that he had lobbied the UN body to honour Mugabe saying it was a "coup for Zimbabwe".
Source - newzimbabwe
